Hello there and welcome back to the Part-Time Creator Academy. In this video, we're going to cover the importance of a good idea as well as what makes a good video idea. So let's get started.
When you're making content with the intention of going viral, your video idea is everything. If you have a bad idea, your video will not go viral no matter how hard you try. But on the other hand, if you have a really good idea that's engaging and compelling, your video will go viral and get a ton of views even if other aspects of your video like the editing and the hashtags are not perfect. The way to think about it is that a really good idea will sell itself.
When it comes to idea generation for viral content, you should be looking at it from a quality over quantity perspective. You may have seen people online who say that you should be posting 3 to 4 times per day, but that's ridiculous. If you look at their methodology behind this, people tell you to post 3 to 4 times per day so that you get more chances of your videos going viral. And that is technically true if you have no idea what you're doing when it comes to content creation. But if you do have even the slightest idea as to what makes a video do well, posting 3 to 4 times per day can actually hurt you. This is because you don't give yourself the time that's required to come up with good video ideas because you're too busy posting 4 times a day. And would you rather post one video every 4 days that gets an average of 100,000 views, or post 4 times a day and each video gets between 100 and 500 views? I would take the 100,000 view video approach any day.
So what makes a good video idea? Video ideas are everywhere, but some of them are better than others. I'm going to give you 4 things to look for that will ensure that your video idea is really good. And I mean like 1 million views good. Now, something to keep in mind with these tips that I'm going to share with you is that you don't need every single one of them in your video to go viral. But the more you have, the better your chances are going to be. Your video can absolutely go viral if you only have one of these tips, but in my opinion you should try to incorporate at least two of them in your video idea for the best chances.
Okay, let's get started.
1. Relatability. This is super important when it comes to creating a good video idea. You want your videos to be relatable to your audience because when the audience relates to the idea or topic that your video is about, they are instantly going to be way more interested in it, as well as they are way more likely to share it with a friend. For example, if you develop a video idea that is based around cooking, people who are also interested in cooking will relate with that idea and are much more likely to stick around and watch. But if someone comes across your content and they hate cooking, they will not relate and will most likely just scroll past your video. This is why having a niche that you create videos in is important because if someone starts following you because they relate with your cooking content and you keep posting cooking content, they'll continue to relate and watch future content you post. Also, on the relatability factor, if you want to post videos that get a ton of views, you want to choose a video idea that is relatable to a large audience and not a small one. If I created content about cooking, there are millions of people who relate to liking cooking, so the chances of my video getting a ton of views is way higher than if I made a video about cryptography. You could have an idea that cryptographers relate to and it could be a really good idea, but the problem is that there just aren't many people who relate and are interested in cryptography. So, even with the best video idea ever, it's going to be a miracle that your video goes viral because the audience that relates to that content just isn't that big.
2. The idea should give the viewer questions. We touch on this concept a little bit later in the course when we talk about hooks, but the idea that you come up with should give the viewer questions. This could be questions like, what does that look like? How does that work? Why are you doing that? What are the benefits of that super specific thing that you're talking about? Etc. The idea should make them think.
3. The idea should provoke reactions. Your idea should provoke a reaction from both the viewer but also the people in the video itself. When you watch an episode of Friends, do you know why they even have a laugh track? This is because just hearing laughter when a joke is made makes it way more likely that you will laugh as well. And the same thing happens with content. If your content shows somebody reacting to something, whether it be laughter, joy, or even sadness, the person watching is much more likely to have the same reaction. And when you get your viewer to have a reaction, ideally a good reaction, they are way more likely to watch longer and share the video. So this means that your idea should try to involve reactions in some way. This is why videos of cute puppies or kittens go viral all the time. It's because they make the viewer feel something.
4. The idea should seem unrealistic. This is kind of a continuation of the last two points about reactions and questions, but your video should, at first glance, seem a little unrealistic. This is because you want people to have a reaction and ask questions like, how is that even possible? And what does that even look like? And have a reaction like, what? No way, that's crazy. If you can strike these questions or reactions in the viewer's mind, they are extremely likely to stick around and watch because they just need to know what happens nextor what this crazy idea that you just talked about even looks like.
Now, I'm going to give you a quick example. You most likely didn't know this, but I actually am an identity... I'm going to give you a quick example. You most likely didn't know this, but I actually am an identical twin. That's right, I have a brother that is the same age as me and looks exactly like me as well. But that's not all. I also have two older brothers that are identical twins as well. This means that there are two sets of twins in my family. I know, it's pretty crazy.
Now, I'm guessing when I told you that, you probably had some sort of a reaction like, what? That's crazy and probably seems a little bit unrealistic. So I took that concept and made a TikTok about it, showcasing that I had two sets of twins in my family. And that video went on to get around 11 million views. Actually, multiple times. I reposted it and it got another many million views. This is primarily because of how rare or unrealistic it seems.
Now, I know that this is an extreme case example and I'm not expecting everyone to have access to two sets of twins, but it just shows that if you can come up with an idea that seems a little bit unrealistic, it can make your video perform really well.
When you boil it down, viral video ideas should:
- Make the viewers share your content.
- Have a high watch time.
That's it. And all these tips that I just shared with you are meant to give you the best chance of making those two things happen.
And that's it for this video. In the next video, I'm going to share with you how to take these principles and use them to create multiple viral videos. Because sure, it's cool to create one viral video, but it's even cooler to create more than one. And that's how you can turn this from a part-time thing into a full-time thing. I'll see you in the next video.